


found under skin

by CrayfishCoffee



Series: pressed between pages [2]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Amnesia, Buried Alive, Character Study, Claustrophobia, Dissociation, Gen, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Modern AU, nothing too graphic but it's still there
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-23
Updated: 2018-11-23
Packaged: 2019-08-06 15:38:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,475
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16390448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrayfishCoffee/pseuds/CrayfishCoffee
Summary: For him, it's easy not to miss something you never even knew you had.In which Mollymauk wakes up with nothing, and begins to build something.Companion piece forpressed between pagesbut can be read as a stand-alone.





	found under skin

**Author's Note:**

> this ended up. more than originally expected

The first thing he notices is cold.

Or at least, he thinks he feels cold.

He doesn’t feel hot. It doesn’t feel warm. He thinks.

He thinks. That is the second thing he notices.

The third is the fact that he can’t breathe, and when he opens his mouth a foul-tasting choking sensation floods his nose and throat.

This upsets him for reasons he doesn’t yet fully grasp, but doesn’t feel is unreasonable.

His limbs feel heavy in a way that feels affected by both internal and external factors, but it seems the new firey panic that ravages its way through his nerves trumps both as his body convulses – desperate to lash out at anything and everything.

This continues on for an eternity stuck in pressured suspension. His body twists. His legs push down against the darkness. He swallows down more of the gritty nothing.

After a meaningless amount of time, some part of the darkness gives away soft under his clawed hand, and breaches. It’s not even a thought when his body wriggles upwards at the new stimuli and eventually he gets his head through and above.

Above.

Through effort that utilizes the adrenaline to its fullest extent, he heaves his upper half up with him. The world is so _bright._ When the all encompassing white receads to the corners of his eyes, he finds his head lolled low, chin against his chest, looking down at dry, dark soil.

Dirt.

He stares.

Dirt.

Something tells him he doesn’t feel cold. Numbness feels awfully close to it though. He forms his first question:

What?

His body uses his arms against the topsoil as leverage to pull the rest of him out. Pausing, it then attempts to stand up. His joints do not support this, and his body crumbles into the ground. Perhaps it is not time to stand yet. His body apparently does not agree with this assessment, as it immediately makes another attempt at verticality.

This again, results in collapse.

On the fifth attempt, it succeeds.

The air feels light against his skin. It’s too light, not light enough, wrong, all he wants, strange and _foreign._ He can’t parse what this is. What? Everything is still too bright. Too much. Too anything.

What?

His leg takes a step forward. Somehow this is much more successful than the standing up. The next step comes even easier. Momentum and constricting muscle carry his body forward at a slow but steady pace through trees. Somewhere far away he can hear brittle things snapping beneath his feet.

He reconsiders whether he is in fact cold. He thinks he might be shivering. It is too much to find out. It is too much to think.

What? What what what what _what what WHAT WHAT WHAT WHAT WHAT?_

Empty.

The trees move past him. He notes them by the space that separates each skyward trunk. Empty.

This goes on for years. This goes on for seconds. This is all that ever was until his body suddenly lurches to a stop. The transition from motion to stagnation makes his insides want to retch, invert, escape out from him. The nothingness in his head swims with vertigo like swirling mist he wants to reach up and claw at the empty empty _empty empty empty–_

When he opens his eyes, he is staring at the ground again. It is different. It is not the black of rich dirt but the mars black of ground that does not snap brittle beneath his feet. It is unyielding and harsh and smooth in a way that makes his skin crawl.

What?

He follows strips of yellow with his eyes up where it bisects the hard ground. It stretches on beyond what he can see. Beyond what exists. Into the empty. Empty. Empty.

There’s a buzzing from under his skin, and the world is getting too bright all at once again and his body’s not moving and his ears are screaming at something they won’t tell him and he’s shivering more and more and more.

The moment he realizes the buzzing on his skin is not coming from within, is the second it and the blinding light vanish together.

His eyes feel dry as his head turns to the left. The endless empty empty road is interrupted by a hulking mass of dark machinery that rumbles and smells of acrid smoke. A section detaches itself from, what turns out to be a motorcycle, and reveals itself to be a figure clad completely in black. Gloves. Leather boots. Leather jacket. Hair the color of bleached bone escaping from the reflective black helmet.

He knows what Death is supposed to look like.

Death, who rides a steed, clad in black, always faceless.

But something is wrong. Where are the other horsemen?

His ears prick up, but still refuse to include him on what secrets they hear. Death’s boots are the same color as the ground, the _road,_ they rest on. Is she saying something? He can’t understand. He doesn’t understand. What? What? _What?_

Empty.

He doesn’t feel himself fall. He feels his muscle give but he doesn’t know why he is suddenly eye-level with the front tire of the motorcycle.

He is being picked up. Death is strong. For some reason he finds this both incredibly fitting and slightly discordant. Of course Death would be _strong,_ but he never really thought physical muscle to be a part of the archetype.

But who is he to question Death? The notion offends him. He is dizzy.

His head rests bonelessly against cool leather. A hard zipper digs into his cheek. The sudden rumble of the engine under him gets one eye to open, gazing just above Death’s arm stretched out to grab the handle. Quickly, the trees begin to move past again, but much, much faster this time. The blur is too fast for his sluggish eyes to attempt to keep track of.

Just where the road meets grass, every so often there’s a flash of purple. Too quick too soon gone. Purple. Nothing. Purple. Empty. Purple. Thistle? Empty.

Empty.

Empty.

 

\----

 

He wakes up either numb or cold, but thankfully covered with a blanket regardless.

His half open eyes sluggishly take in the room without moving his head. The thought of bodily motion is not a thought. It is a far off shore. Everything is too bright again, _again,_ except the pale-painted walls only serve to horribly amplify that whiteness instead of absorb it the way the dark forest had.

Death sits arms-crossed, napping in a chair against the window. She is lightly snoring.

Between them on a bedside table is a single short-stemmed flower sitting in a beige, plastic hospital cup. Its orange petals are the most colorful thing he sees in the room.

He’s sure he knows the name of it.

He’s asleep before he can remember.

 

\----

 

The doctors ask him questions. Each one illuminates the blank spaces where answers should be.

His mind feels like a magazine that has been thoroughly ransacked by an avid scrapbooker. All the important objects and text have been neatly cut out, only leaving filler space and empty margins for pages in an issue with the cover ripped off.

It’s not like a toddler ripping pages out of a book. He knows things. But he doesn’t always know them, the slow trickle of general information comes to him bit by bit.

This is a bed. Obviously it’s a bed, how could he not _know_ it’s a bed?

But besides obvious knowledge that prevents him from being a total newborn, nothing else comes back. The doctors are worried he is in a complete fugue state. Probably because he hasn’t spoken a word to them. Hasn’t spoken a word at all.

Can he speak? Is it something he forgot or is he just choosing not to?

Who is he?

He finds this question oddly less distressing than not knowing what his blood type is.

He doesn’t even remember what blood is categorized into, what makes each so special. But it feels important. It feels so important he vomits onto the floor in despair one night and a nurse comes in to fiddle with his IV bag.

The IV needle is snuggly inserted and taped down onto an area of his skin directly next to an eye tattoo on his hand. There is one to match on the opposite side. They stand out impossibly bright against his purple skin – neat lines in gruesome red.

He wonders whether they witnessed what happened to him. Whether they know who he is.

He hates them.

Death stays. That surprises him. Death stays and watches with pale, mismatched eyes framed by too much black eyeshadow.

Better dead than red.

 

\----

 

The nurses have to sedate him in the A.M. after he rips out his IV scratching his skin bloody over the tattoos on his hand.

He does not remember this.

 

\----

 

Death drops by, and adds another flower to his cup he’s refused to let the nurses take. Death has also tried to at least get rid of the wilting ones, to his great dismay and hand-swatting.

He knows it’s silly. Probably not a _great_ look either.

But he likes to count the flowers, even the ones already shriveled and dried. He counts them and takes into account their gradient stages of vitality.

It’s always the same kind of flower. He still can’t remember what they’re called for the life of him. It’s not anything fancy. It’s a simple name, one that he shouldn’t be having this much trouble with.

There’s a cutout in his mind shaped like those flowers that’s – empty.

Empty.

Empty.

No.

Enough.

_Enough._

“Aren’t these–”

His throat stings and _tickles_ like his throat is made of carbonated sandpaper and he immediately dissolves into a hunched over coughing fit. What’s that old saying?

Use it or lose it?

Maybe he was just an overly lazy bastard in his past life.

Once he feels he can breath without choking, he manages to complete his thought, “–Aren’t these from the flower beds outside?”

Death is staring at him with eyes wide, looking as taken aback as he feels. Truth be told he himself hadn’t expected his own verbalization until it was already happening.

“I can see them from my window.” He hopes his normal speaking voice isn’t this scratchy. Scratchy voices can be sexy when done right, not when sounding like a desert left to dry.

Death slowly, stiffly turns her head to the window, as if to check his claim. She equally as stiffly turns back.

“So. You talk.”

He shrugs. “Apparently.”

Death doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t say anything. They both kind of just continue staring at each other. Friendly staring, with only understandable amounts of disbelief. Death very, very slowly eases herself down into her customary chair, as if still deciding on the descent. He grins in a way that he thinks is charmingly reassuring. He licks at the taste of copper from where his chapped lips crack under the stretch.

“The doctors can’t match you to any of their records. They just call you John Doe.” Death states in lieu of the obvious question.

Ugh. _John_. That won’t do.

His disgust must show in his face, because she adds, “For some reason they’ve put down the initials M.T. off to the side though.”

Empty empty empty _empty EMPTY–_

Molly just barely nods his dizzy head.

“M.T. is better than John at least.”

Death raises an eyebrow on an otherwise perfectly stoic face. “Do you really want to be called Mr. T?”

That forced out a hoarse laugh from him, which devolves into ugly coughing which he flawlessly transitions back into a controlled chuckle.

He adds general figures of the cultural zeitgeist to the list he doesn’t have of things he still knows.

“I’ll think on that. Mr. _Tea_ sounds like he could be Mr. Roger’s friend so I’m not strictly opposed.”

What he knows: John Doe, M.T., Mr. T, Mr. Rogers and–

MARIGOLDS.

He points at his flower cup. “Those are marigolds!”

Death flicks her eyes to the flowers, then back at him. She nods a slow, careful nod as if sudden movement might disturb some invisible, metaphorical glass balanced on top of her head.

He grins and grins and tastes blood in his mouth.

 

\----

 

He remembers to ask one day, why she’s still sticking around. He feels like he’s walking away from her door if anything.

Death looks out at the rolling clouds. “I was following a storm when I found you.”

 

\----

 

The doctors get very excited when Molly begins speaking.

They get less excited when he can tell them nothing they don’t already know.

He almost kisses the nurse who tells him he has O- blood. Her name is Alex. She’s his favorite.

He has O- blood and marigolds and feels better every day.

When he finally looks at himself in the mirror, he finds more eyes.

He contrarily finds that he likes his own. Clouded over like blood dispersed in milk without iris or pupil to speak of. They’re meant more for reflection than surveillance. Those are _his_.

The eyes under his skin, those are _not._

He has a legitimate split-second of mind-numbing terror when he discovers another one snug up against his neck. This leads to a painstaking, desperate full body search.

He finds one more on his shoulder blade. The last of six but one of four too many.

They stare aloof at him from the mirror. Unblinking. Unfeeling.

Not _him_.

He knows with deadly certainty, that they will always unsettle him more than the amnesia could ever hope to.

 

\----

 

Alex has a tattoo of ivy crawling up the inside of her right upper arm, that escapes whenever her scrub sleeves pull back just so.

 

\----

 

He is genuinely, fully taken aback when he learns that Death isn’t Death.

He sees her write her name on the release forms they co-sign, and it’s so strange but so _obvious_ seeing it in messy, scrawled letters.

But then again, that’s what his entire life has been: strange but obvious realizations.

He likes the feeling of the pen in his hand. He’s relieved he thankfully still retains the ability to write.

He loves the way his name loops onto the page.

They enter the hospital Death and John Doe.

They leave it Yasha and Mollymauk Tealeaf.

 

\----

 

For Bring-Your-Amnesiac-To-Work Day, Yasha lets Molly tag along with her to the club-slash-bar she works as a bouncer at.

It’s situated in an area that could be vaguely described as not necessarily the worst part of town, and most _definitely_ not the best. They serve alcohols he’s pretty sure not even non-amnesiacs could name, do burlesque and drag in turn, and is situated snugly between an abandoned building and an occult shop that makes the air outside smell like a mystifying fusion of booze, sweat, and incense.

The neon lights really serve to accent this whole black-grey-white thing Yasha’s got going on.

It’s called _El Carnival_.

Molly falls in love _instantly_.

He initially just hangs around to keep Yasha company, but it doesn’t take too long till the owner of the place takes notice of him and co-ops him into some of the more active roles. Molly learns how to mix drinks, toss bottles, light glasses on fire, and many, _many_ other tricks of the trade.

If he occasionally gets roped into a couple of stage performances here and there, who is he to complain?

 

\----

 

He discovers while talking to the owner of the club and the wrinkled shopkeep of the occult store that he can understand and speak Spanish, and moderately fluent cajun French, respectively.

 

\----

 

Yasha walks out the door one day with a faded backpack on her shoulder with a passing, “I’ll be back soon.”

It’s the first twenty-four hours of his life spent alone.

It turns into two days. Two and a half.

When Yasha returns he doesn’t say anything for hours. He doesn’t say he hasn’t left the apartment. He doesn’t say he hasn’t eaten. Hasn’t been able to keep down food. Hasn’t been able to breath in the long hours of the night, afraid to close his eyes. Hasn’t been able to look at the walls without seeing them closing in.

He doesn’t say don’t leave me again.

They fall asleep together on the couch mid-episode of whatever was on TV, his head in her lap and her hand on his back.

 

\----

 

The first thing he does with the money he saves is try to pay Yasha rent.

To be fair he doesn’t really know how much rent should be, and had to look up an approximation online since Yasha refused to tell him when he brought it up. When he tries to give her the money though, it takes all the willpower and charisma in his body to barely make her take half.

Which is, totally unacceptable.

It’s unacceptable because Yasha just brought him home with her like a mutt from the shelter, expecting nothing from him except to not pee on her carpet while she’s out.

He becomes very good at sliding her money in hidden places, because she deserves more than he can give.

He tucks bills into her wallet because she doesn’t talk about her past, or ask him about his.

He hides dollars in her jacket pockets because when she finds him in the dark, staring up at the moon, she pours an extra glass of water for him.

He makes breakfast every day because she lets him even though he’s a barely decent cook, neither of them acknowledging how his hands shake in the early hours of the day.

He distributes rent over lunches, gifts, and slight of hand because when he steals her fingerless gloves, she lets him.

He loves her because she doesn’t comment on how he keeps them on always, only removing them to quickly shower.

The second thing he does with his money is get a snake tattooed up his hand.

It hurts like hell, more than he expected, but he keeps dutifully still while the needle does its sweet work. The pain is almost cleansing, fiery hot as it wipes the slate clean.

He still wears colorful scarves and high collared shirts and doesn’t linger naked in front of the mirror. But now at least, you have to look for the eyes to notice them hidden within the black ink.

He feels a sense of victory in the way the black serpent envelopes, overtakes his hand now. It’s dominance. Integration.

It’s _his_ now.

When Molly slips Yasha back her gloves, her eyes trail up his hand with cool impartiality.

“Cool.”

 

\----

 

He gets more skilled with paying secret rent by the day. His jewelry collection grows faster than he would have expected – he becomes well acquainted with the best spots to buy the cheapest and most garish things that sparkle.

His boss Gustav says that he’s either a magpie or the flashiest sonofabitch he’s ever met.

The turquoise feathers on Molly’s cheek flutter in tandem with his toothy, uneven grin.

 

\----

 

Yasha opens the flower shop.

Molly of course helps out, getting the place ready and helping her sort through inventory. He finds better ways to lie his way out of rooms with bags of fertilizer. Not that he needs to. Not that Yasha believes him anyways.

Molly plants orchids in his calf.

 

\----

 

Eventually he finds his own place with rent he can confidently keep up with.

Yasha doesn’t force him out. She doesn’t really say anything when he starts his search, and starts collecting his things from around the place. He appreciates her help carrying some of the heavy boxes, and is sure that secretly she is going to be a little relieved not being exposed to his naked ass on the daily.

He has a great ass.

He is also an Ass.

But at least he has enough insight to admit it.

He puts up a bead curtain in his doorway. When Yasha slaps the back of his shoulder in exasperation and makes Molly yelp, she discovered another healing tattoo barely a day old.

She puts a four-month limit till his next one, which he tries to haggle down to one but ends up three.

He pierces his tongue two days later.

 

\----

 

Yasha mostly keeps to the shop nowadays, but still comes by the club every once in a while to puff up and look intimidating for old times sake. In turn Molly will occasionally take up shifts at the shop while Yasha leaves on her trips or let himself in with the spare key he still has to nap on her couch.

This time though, when Yasha comes over its a special occasion.

Jester’s doing her first burlesque performance tonight, which is all she’s been talking about for the past month and a half. Apparently her mother was a very well-regarded burlesque performer who would, with a lot of winking on Jester’s part, do some extra behind-the-curtain performances as well. If what Yasha says is true about her supposed finances, her mother must indeed service some _very_ well-to-do people.

Molly is very fond of Jester. She always tries to make people smile and that’s something he values highly. He’s even, under _careful_ supervision, allowed her to design some of the tattoos on his lower back.

He is a little disappointed that he will have to watch most of the performance from the bar, but his co-worker called in sick last minute and there was no one else to pick up his shift. He does have a good view of the table Beau’s at with some other friends Jester has brought in to watch her debut.

Or more accurately, the table that Beau is currently ditching in favor of a spot near Yasha, who is leaning up against the wall near the bar. Probably a combination of social nervousness and wanting to keep Molly company.

Seeing the way Beau mirrors the arms-crossed posture of Yasha makes Molly smile to himself. Yasha’s the type of person who’s attracted a long list of admirers, and consequently left a lot of people disappointed in her wake. He’s interested to see how this one will play out.

He pulls a couple of flashier stunts with his drink mixing tonight, a lot of juggling and trick shots, partially just to make Beau and Yasha roll their eyes. But also, he’s the one getting extra tips so it’s a two-in-one gratification he’ll take any day.

Enough time passes that eventually even Beau realizes it would be rude not to return to her friends, or maybe she’s just reached her flustered limit and tells Yasha she’ll see her later. Molly gives her table a closer eye over when they welcome her back:

A tall orcish-looking man in a black shirt that compliments the very handsome salt-and-pepper he’s got going on.

A goblin woman he almost missed that he’s pretty sure is already halfway to sloshed.

And a dude in a brown sweater who hasn’t looked up from his phone since they arrived.

Hm.

Molly returns to his barkeep duties, only wondering about them vaguely in the back of his mind. They’re not the weirdest people he’s seen in the place.

Not by a longshot.

Somewhere around the ten minute mark before the show is scheduled to start, Beau suddenly comes rushing up through the crowd, but to his immense surprise instead of Yasha, she veers off in his direction. Before he can get out a syllable she thrusts her body onto the bar, stashing something onto the shelf directly under the counter.

She looks at him with a wild grin on her face, “Keep this away from Caleb.” And she’s gone.

Molly glances down at the phone that Beau has just imposed onto his bar. As he goes to reach for it, a familiar brown sweater rushes up to the counter, looking flustered and not a little bit irritated.

“Excuse me,” Brown Sweater huffs, obviously out of breath, “I believe my, _friend_ just came by here and I was wondering if maybe she gave you a phone?”

Ah. So Brown Sweater must be Caleb.

Caleb has a thick accent that pairs very well with this disheveled academic thing that’s happening – grungy, but not in the practiced way rich hipsters try to be.

Molly pivots his hand to grab a glass sitting next to the phone, and takes out a rag to clean it in an obviously fictitious way.

“Nope, can’t say that she has. Can I get you something else though?” he gestures with his rag to the bottles of alcohol lining the shelves behind him. He can tell Caleb doesn’t seem to fully believe him, his squinted eyes glancing at his pockets and face, but eventually he asks for two glasses of whatever’s strongest and heads back to his table.

Beau’s already found her way back by the time Caleb returns, and after passing off a glass to the goblin woman he looks like he’s arguing with her, while she’s laughing.

Before it develops any further than that, Gustav strolls onstage to announce Jester. With a wave of his hand, the lights dip lower, and music begins to rise.

 

\----

 

Jester buys everyone a round to celebrate afterwards.

Jester buys _several_ rounds.

She and Yasha are the only ones to leave that night close to sober.

 

\----

 

Jester deserves a gift for three reasons: that magnificent performance she put on last night, her upcoming birthday, and just because Molly is in a gift-giving mood.

He was able to reduce his hangover, with help from some magical shenanigans, to a manageable state, and so walking in the sunlight doesn’t make him feel entirely vampiric. Nonetheless, he’s happy the mom-and-pop bookstore he knows Jester likes is only a couple blocks away.

Despite being a hole in the wall, he finds it easily enough. A little bell chimes when he opens the door. There’s no one at the counter, but the sign says open so he flips up his shades to get a better look around.

Hmm. Boring, boring, boring, boring … bingo.

He zeroes in on a shelf in the back, dedicated to books with well-oiled men dominating the covers, and women with faces overwhelmed with unbearable lust, or just a really bad case of the runs. He traces his hand over the spines, pulling out a select few to chuckle at. He pulls out one with a devilish looking tiefling on it, shirtless and clutching an entranced farmhand to his side.

Molly ponders it for a moment. Things to add to the bucket list: model for a horrendous smut novel cover.

He puts it back, and is reading random snippets of one he thinks Jester might like, when he glances up and nearly jumps out of his skin. Staring up at him from the end of the bookshelf, is an orange tabby cat. It sits perfectly still, staring up at him with gleaming yellow eyes.

For a split second Molly almost feels as if he’s somehow been caught in the wrong, before shaking it off and squatting down to put a hand out. “Well aren’t you a handsome little thing?”

The cat doesn’t make a move to come closer, opting instead to continue its silent staring. Then, its ears twitch, and it chirps at him before getting up and walking out of eyesight.

Well. Molly follows.

This time, sitting at the counter is Caleb, wearing the same sweater from yesterday and looking especially haggard. He is visibly, painfully hungover with a hand shielding his eyes, yet still seemingly making a valiant effort to read, if the book he is hunched over is anything to go by.

The tabby gracefully jumps onto the counter, purring while it forces its body up under his chin, and he absently scritches it with the hand previously over his eyes. It’s then he finally notices Molly standing there, and clears his throat and closes his book. Molly catches a glimpse of the cover: old and well-worn, no title or text. What gets his attention is the single decoration in the center.

A raised illustration of a single plain thistle.

Molly is a superstitious person. He thinks after being pulled off the side of the road by Death, he has every right to be.

He gives black cats right of way, pinches salt, knocks on wood and only has occasional staring contests with the evil eye on days he has a death wish.

So when he sees a thistle on the book of a stranger he just met last night, he pays attention.

“Well hello there Mr. Caleb! Didn’t I see you at my bar last night?” Molly does him the service of not _yelling,_ but still can’t help himself from projecting his voice loud enough to see a crease of discomfort form across Caleb’s brow.

Caleb looks at him, eyes squinted before nodding. “I believe you were the bartender correct? You are a difficult face to forget.”

Well, doesn’t he know how to flatter a lady.

“Just this I think today.” Molly plops the book onto the counter. Caleb glances at the dashing orc posturing on the cover.

“... Excellent choice.”

“Oh I’m sure it is,” Molly smirks, “Not my first pick but I’m sure Jester is going to get a good kick out of it.” Caleb raises his eyebrows and nods appreciatively as he places the book into a brown paper bag. Molly gestures at the thistle book. “And what’s that one there about?”

“Oh, boring things. Alchemical uses for plants and their component potentials for arcane magic.”

Molly perks up. “Do you do magic, Mr. Caleb? Because I happen to dabble in such things a little bit myself.”

Caleb looks skeptical. “The real or, performance kind?”

Molly grins wide as he leans his body just slightly over the counter, cognizant of every carnie-adjacent marker on his body.

“Why, I don’t see why it can’t be a little bit of both?”

 

\----

 

Molly returns to the shop, collecting hours between shelves and buying smut books he reads most of on location.

He recommends hole-in-the-walls, and Caleb recommends literature.

Molly fakes preoccupation as an excuse to why they stack up barely touched on his nightstand, before finally admitting to Caleb he can’t understand half the words in them.

 

\----

 

“Is it even ethical to date you Molly?”

“Shut _up,_ Yasha.”

“You’re basically two years old.”

“ _You’re_ basically two years old!”

 

\----

 

Caleb is _smart_ in ways Molly never can be or appreciate on the same intellectual level, but goddamn if he doesn’t love hearing him lecture on things that go over his head anyways.

 

\----

 

He discovers Caleb has a photographic memory and can unfailingly tell the exact hour of the day, with uncanny precision.

He takes advantage of this as much as is to be expected.

 

\----

 

When Molly asks for Caleb’s number and texts him later, Caleb immediately responds.

Caleb: why are you already a contact in my phone.

Molly: ;) a magician never reveals his secrets. you should know this Caleb

He doesn’t tell him how when he had brief possession of it, he happened to guess his password right on the second try.

 

\----

 

“What’s the second line on page thirty-seven?”

“‘Her heaving bosom glinted with sweat, rising and falling with lust.’”

 

\----

 

Some days Caleb doesn’t talk. Some days he buries his face in his books, pretending to read while his eyes are unfocused on something beyond the page. Molly places mugs of earl grey next to him, the traditional bastard, even when they grow cold untouched.

 

\----

 

“Ninth page, fourth stanza.”

“I don’t read poetry, Molly.”

“Then fret not, poor Caleb, I will read it to you.”

 

\----

 

It’s hard not to notice the way Nott clings to Caleb in a crowd. The way she hides herself behind him and always has a hand close to his coat.

It’s easier to miss the way she will tug on his sleeve and his breathing will get easier. The way in which she will subtly position herself in front of him when he suddenly gets quiet. How despite the tension in her shoulders, she never abandons Caleb in a room, always evaluating first or following him out.

After one too many flasks she will sit on his shoulders, carding her fingers through his hair and snarling at anyone who is anything less than kind.

She never snarls at Molly.

 

\----

 

“Page fourteen, third line from the bottom.”

“‘A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.’”

“Why yes, yes I do.”

 

\----

 

Molly keeps waiting for Caleb to ask questions about his past.

He never does.

Molly returns the favor.

 

\----

 

One day while Caleb is in the back of the shop, Molly reaches over the counter where Caleb keeps his idle time books. He pockets the old receipt being used as a bookmark, and replaces it with a single red rose.

 

\----

 

Molly finally convinces Yasha to host a flower stand at the local lunar festival, after a lot of moaning, groaning, and whining on his part. She makes him almost throw out his back carrying all the heavy boxes she could have handled no sweat, but it’s worth it.

There’s fairy lights, paper and pole lamps everywhere that makes the whole thing glow once the sun begins to properly set. The air smells like sugar, cider, and the kind of excitable mysticism only light-hearted giggling and sparklers in the dark can evoke.

The silver moon dangling from his horn tinkles with delight.

Molly helps Yasha weave flower crowns for children until the moon rises higher in the cloudless sky, and then he settles down into his own empty patch of grass. He spreads out his jacket and takes off his shoes, digging lit candles into the dirt around him and begins shuffling his cards.

Not all of his fortunes are exactly, _real_ per say. Not all the time. They don’t have to be fully committed or purely accurate during moments when it’s all done for shits and giggles.

But tonight’s a special night. So Molly puts his full concentrated energy into every single one, for everyone who asks.

Children are drawn more towards the showman aspects to it, the elaborate shuffling and pretty pictures on the cards while having no patience for his full explanations. The teenagers love the arcane nature of it, watching the cards with breathless suspense and hanging onto his every interpretation like they can unfold even more secrets from them. Adults pass it up the most, but the elderly always come back, smiling softly through it with the knowledge of ones who have already witnessed fate and chance run their course more than a few times.

Jester of course comes by for a few. She asks of love as she always does, jittery with anticipation despite the similar answers that come every time.

During an off-period, where he idly shuffles his cards in random intervals to let them each get a taste of moonlight, he spots in his periphery the back of a tall grey firbolg with a flash of pink for hair. He’s stopped at Yasha’s stall and it’s, it’s strangely difficult to look at him directly, his eyes unable to focus. He feels a bizarre overwhelming sense of deja vu, not unpleasant but off-putting nonetheless. As the firbolg walks away, a shiver runs up his spine truly as if someone has just walked over his grav–

“Care for some cider, Mr. Mollymauk?” A germanic accent interrupts him from lingering on the feeling, and Caleb is standing over him with a steaming mug in each hand.

“Don’t mind if I do, thank you.” There’s a faint tremor to his hand when he reaches up for the mug, but the warm weight of it cradled in his laced fingers settles it quick enough. If Caleb notices it, he doesn’t say anything. “And what exactly is the occasion, if you don’t mind me asking.”

Caleb shrugs, sipping from his own cup as he shifts his weight from one foot to the other. “I just noticed it has been a couple hours since you’ve gotten up from your work, and thought it might do you some good.”

And what a gentleman he is.

Molly does indeed relish the warm spices as they hit his tongue. “And what time is it exactly, Caleb?”

Caleb takes a quick pause. “Hm. Exactly one minute after ten I believe.”

Molly halts the cup at his mouth.

1 minute after 10. 10:01.

That’s a palindrome. And palindromes are important. They are important but also complicated, because something that so easily loops back over itself can be hard to pin down, as they tend to reverse themselves on you quickly and without you noticing.

But the moon is high, and palindromes are important so Molly sets his cider aside after one more sip, and pats the space opposite of him on the coat.

“Tell you what Mr. Caleb, one cider for one reading. I think that only sounds fair.”

Caleb seems dubious, but amused more than anything so he sits legs crossed still holding onto his mug. “I think this is more of Jester’s thing than mine, Mollymauk.”

“Just humor me.” Molly doesn’t get nervous during his readings, but there is an extra foreign energy crawling under his skin in this moment.

The first time they met, Mollymauk served Caleb from across a counter. The second, they traded places, Caleb serving Mollymauk from the opposite side. This time, however, Molly might be conducting the experience but the cards are a level playing field. The reading depends equally on both parties, neither directly serving the other.

“What question would you like to ask?”

Caleb seems thoughtful, seemingly lost for a moment. He brings the cup up to his mouth a couple times, before he looks back up with what counts as a cheeky grin, coming from him.

“Jester always asks about love, yes? Then tell me, Mr. Mollymauk, what do the cards say about my love life?”

Molly’s mouth cuts a grin the same shape as a crescent moon, shuffles the deck and shakes his head slightly.

“Mr. Caleb, if you wanted to know about love, I don’t even need to ask the cards for that.”

 

\----

 

Yasha offered once, only once, amidst the first two weeks Molly stayed with her.

“I don’t remember the exact spot,” She said unprompted, the two of them watching chefs make bread on the TV, “But I could probably find the general area on the highway, if you want me to take you there.”

Molly tugged the gloves tighter down his wrists, and said he’d think about it, even though he didn’t. He didn’t have to.

He buys his cards second-hand, and learns how to craft his own answers. He only asks of the now, the now, the now and the future.

**Author's Note:**

> Chasing it down - mother mother
> 
> I'd also like to take this opportunity to shamelessly plug Overdrive, which is basically your local library on your phone where you can digitally check out books and audio books !!! ( which author's note is also totally what Caleb was glued to on his phone )  
> If you are like me and love snuggling in with your phone to read fic, please consider also checking out some books to read when your fic list runs dry :)
> 
> [tumblr](http://crayfishcoffee.tumblr.com/) \- [twitter](https://twitter.com/crayfishcoffee)


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